


Bounded in a Nutshell

by thehollowones



Category: Doctor Who, Doctor Who & Related Fandoms, Doctor Who (2005)
Genre: Anorexia, Dark, Eating Disorders, Friendship, Gen, Mental Instability
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-01-01
Updated: 2016-01-01
Packaged: 2018-05-10 19:10:42
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 427
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5597551
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/thehollowones/pseuds/thehollowones
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>"O God, I could be bounded in a nutshell, and count myself a king of infinite space, were it not that I have bad dreams" - Hamlet.</p><p> Rose's eating disorder returns.</p><p>Cross-posted from ff.net</p>
            </blockquote>





	Bounded in a Nutshell

It starts again so quickly. She is in a high security cell on the planet of At, reluctantly playing damsel in distress. After a few long hours of banging on the walls and cursing, the slot in the door slides open to reveal a tray full of congealed something. It looks like graying spaghetti with white disks of what might be meat. And Rose looks at her meal and thinks, don’t.

And she doesn’t.

Two days later, bones singing with every footfall, she traipses through a 32nd –century marketplace with the Doctor and Jack, looking at all the people. Jack swipes a pear from a stall and presents it to her with a wink. And Rose looks at it and Rose thinks, don’t.

And she doesn’t.

Two weeks later and there is more hair in her hairbrush than there was the day before. Three weeks later and her bones have stopped singing. They are screaming, aching, trembling at every touch. She walks up and down the halls of the TARDIS, shaking her arms out, blinking her dry eyes. _This is what living looks like now_ , she tells herself. All doors lead to the kitchen.

And then Rose is in the kitchen and her bones are screaming so so loudly and her rib cage is coiled inside her like a spring that just might burst free. And she is eating. Stuffing food in her mouth like she is returning it to its mother’s arms. _Here you go, here you go._ She takes horrible gasping breaths in between bites. She needs more.

And then Rose is in the hallway and then Rose is in the bathroom except she isn’t because the bathroom has turned itself into a linen closet. And Rose is standing in a linen closet with two fingers hovering at her mouth and she is screaming, quiet little screams at each outbreath and then there is Jack.

Jack asks if she wants the Doctor. And she might have laughed at that but her stomach is so distended that her bones have stopped talking all together. Jack asks if she wants her mother. Rose thinks about how every time her mother touches her, she is using her fingers to excavate for bones.

So they sit in the linen closet and Rose tries to think her thoughts hard enough so that Jack can hear them. She keeps her hands stretched in front of her, afraid to touch her own heretic flesh.

 _I’m scared,_ she thinks. _I’m scared, I’m scared, I’m scared._

_How can the whole universe not be enough?_

**Author's Note:**

> Nobody deserves to suffer like this. Please seek help.
> 
> I do not own the rights to these characters.


End file.
